After a seven-year gap, domestic flights resumed from Pathankot airport on Thursday with the landing of an Alliance Air Delhi-Pathankot-Delhi flight.
The flight was resumed under Udaan scheme — the Centre’s regional connectivity scheme (RCS). The 70-seater airbus, which took off from Delhi at 10 am, landed Pathankot at around 11 am which was received by Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh.
With this, the region’s connectivity and tourism potential is expected to get the much-needed boost.
The flight will shuttle between Delhi and Pathankot thrice a week on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday. From Pathankot, it departed for Delhi at 12 noon.
Accompanied by Punjab Congress president and Gurdaspur MP Sunil Jakhar, Capt Amarinder was at the airport to welcome the passengers on board the first civil flight that arrived from Delhi at the airport shortly after noon.
The Chief Minister said that it was a red letter day for the region, which had now got air connectivity with the rest of country.
Further, being at the tri-junction of Himachal Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir, Pathankot would also get a huge boost to its tremendous tourism potential as a result of the launch of the flight, which would operate on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday every week, he added.
The Chief Minister said that the government’s plans to develop an international-standard tourist destination at Pathankot-Dalhousie road near Ranjit Sagar lake would also give a huge fillip to the region’s tourism industry, as it was expected to draw more than 50,000 tourists annually.
The launch of flight was the result of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed between Punjab Government, Union Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA) and the Airports Authority of India on June 15, 2017, for starting flights under RCS from ludhiana, Adampur, Bathinda and Pathankot.
Under the MoU, there are four flights already in service in Bathinda (which is now connected to Delhi and Jammu) and two in ludhiana (connecting to Jammu).
Punjab Government and the Centre were working to start flights from Adampur Airport at the earliest, said the Chief Minister.
Built at a cost of Rs 37 crore over 11 years ago, Pathankot airport had domestic flight operations for around two-and-a-half years. A private airline Air Deccan ran its service but suspended operations due to poor occupancy of its flights.
later, with the efforts of the then Gurdaspur MP Vinod Khanna, the Air India agreed to operate on this sector and started its flights in 2010, but halted its operations a year later in 2011 citing losses.
Since then there was no domestic flight.
Meanwhile, the airport’s runway was being used by the Army to transport goods and personnel off and on.
There is also an occasional chartered flight carrying VIPs and film actors, especially during the election time.